Some users may not mind the price or bulk of the Surface Pro if it frees them from carrying a tablet for some uses and a laptop for others. But like many products that try to be two things at once, the new Surface Windows 8 Pro does neither as well as those designed for one function.

You might laugh, but it’s true — a look back at Dell’s biggest attempts to crack the consumer market and compete with Apple over the past 10 years reveals an embarrassing series of missteps, mistakes, and flat-out bad software, culminating in a flurry of poorly-executed mobile devices in 2010 that sealed the company’s fate. As the world went mobile, Dell stopped moving. “We’re no longer a PC company,” said Dell VP Brad Anderson last year. “We’re an IT company.” We’ll see how Dell manages this new chapter of its life in the months ahead — but for now, let’s just slide on down Dell’s sad little spiral together.

“Do I wish that we would have gone all-in on mobile and made a bigger commitment to it earlier?” Mark Pincus, Zynga’s founder and chief executive, said in an interview after the earnings release. “Yes.”

Google Inc.’s YouTube is negotiating a $50 million equity investment in music video service Vevo LLC, according to two people with knowledge of the situation.

Google would own less than 10 percent of the company, giving Vevo a valuation of at least $500 million, said the people, who asked for anonymity because negotiations are still early and an agreement may not be reached.

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